When Cindi Chouinard Quinn-Ventura graduated from Tecumseh High School in 1984, she figured she'd go into business. What she didn't plan on was that someday that business would involve gray blending, scar camouflage, and a front-row seat to the human experience — one haircut at a time.
Today, she owns Katherine Drew Salon in Livonia, a modern and sunlit space about an hour from her hometown. The name is a family tribute drawn from her mother and godfather and passed along to her daughters, Olivia Katherine and Madison Drew. It's personal, just like everything about her salon.
Before she ever picked up a color swatch, Quinn-Ventura spent more than three decades building a corporate resume. After graduating from Eastern Michigan University in 1988 with a degree in business, marketing, and management, she tried a little of everything, including auto show modeling, medical supply sales, and commercial real estate. She spent eight years at DTE Energy, where she climbed the ladder through positions in power sales, the legal department, and public affairs. Along the way, she acquired her Project Management certification, earned a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt, and completed a two-year leadership program.
"I'm a learner by nature," said Quinn-Ventura. "I loved the constant training. I loved mentoring people, helping them find their strengths. There was something really fulfilling about leading a team." But the structure of corporate life, with its rules, policies, and checklists, eventually felt more limiting than supportive. "It was very black and white. I was ready for more creativity and shades of gray."
That shift came in 2018, when Quinn-Ventura took early retirement and circled back to a longtime dream: something in fashion or beauty. The timing was almost cinematic. A close friend — her stylist since the early 1990s — was finally ready to sell her salon. "We literally worked out the deal on the phone while my husband, who is a commercial real estate agent, thought he was getting a business to sell," said Quinn-Ventura with a laugh. She took over the salon on January 1, 2019.
Now, she runs the front desk, coordinates marketing, follows up with clients, and supports a team of stylists and estheticians. During our conversation, Quinn-Ventura was doing all of that at once, pausing mid-sentence to greet clients; book appointments; and quietly welcome a woman wearing yoga pants, Crocs, and butterfly-print shirt — and surely possessing a story Quinn-Ventura couldn't wait to uncover. "I am seriously interested in people," she said. "I want to know their story and what makes them tick. You just have to find the right way to ask."
Her approach is rooted in her parents' example. Her mom, Katie, is a gentle force: a caretaker; a champion of the underdog; and someone who "never saw color, age, or religion." Her dad, Paul, ran a business supplying bingo and carnival equipment and taught her to "go back to the numbers." Emotion has a place, he told her, but not when it comes to profit and loss. "I remind myself all the time: This is a salon, yes — but it's also a business," said Quinn-Ventura.
That mindset helped her modernize and grow the business. Katherine Drew Salon now offers traditional services as well as eyebrow microblading, stretch mark and scar camouflage, and 3D tattooing for clients who've undergone mastectomies. Gray blending — gently transitioning from dyed to natural color — is one of the salon's most requested services.
The industry has taken notice. In 2024, Salon Today featured Quinn-Ventura's second-act success story in a special issue. In 2025, her salon earned a spot on the "Salon Today 200," a national list honoring top salons for growth, innovation, and client care.
Looking back, Quinn-Ventura said she wouldn't trade the years she spent in the corporate world, but she might have jumped into her passion sooner. "I never had a job I hated," she said. "But I would've done what I loved a lot earlier if I'd known how good it would feel." Now, with a salon full of stories and a steady stream of new faces at the door, she's exactly where she's meant to be.
Cindi Quinn-Ventura
Katherine Drew Salon
33625 Seven Mile Rd, Livonia
248-478-2626
katherinedrewsalon.co
Dr. Carlos Casanova: Professor, Mentor, Community Builder
The plan after graduating from Adrian High School in 2001 was to work at an auto factory. Growing up on the east side of Adrian and coming from a long line of Tejanos from Texas who left Michigan's fields for its factories during the 1950s and 60s, Carlos Casanova knew he could make "a good living" doing that. Instead, a series of events — both unfortunate and fortuitous — led him to a career he never imagined. Today, Carlos Casanova, PhD, is an assistant professor of education at Arizona State University, whose work focuses on Latinx youth critical consciousness development and empowerment within community-based organizations and afterschool programs.
In high school, Casanova, proud son of Jackie Billages and the late Gilbert Casanova, was more into sports than academics. "There weren't too many people telling us, well, academics can also take you places. It was always sports, sports, sports. That's kind of the environment I grew up in," Casanova said. "Nobody talked to us about college."
Drugs and domestic violence were part of that environment too, Casanova explained, but so was being part of a loving and caring large extended family that provided a stabilizing influence. His grandmother, he remembers in particular, encouraged him to do well in school. Casanova excelled in basketball and football, but noted, "I wasn't very good in school. I didn't get good grades." He could do the work; he simply wasn't interested. Casanova shared that grades mattered for sports eligibility. "But I wasn't learning anything related to who I was, and I was just disconnected from [the classroom]."
After graduation, Casanova described working odd jobs and spending time "running around in the streets with friends doing stuff that we probably shouldn't have been doing." Then, in February of 2002, a violent tragedy changed the trajectory of Casanova's life. His best friend, Marcus Newsom, was murdered in a drive-by shooting in Adrian in a case of mistaken identity. Casanova, then 19, was one of the last people to see Newsom alive that terrible night. In the difficult weeks and months that followed, Casanova decided he was ready to start a new chapter.
With help from friends and his former second-grade teacher and her family, Casanova enrolled at Jackson Community College in Adrian that fall, learning about social inequalities in his sociology courses. "It started making sense to me why I grew up in situations that I grew up in," he said. "Why these areas are the way they are and what creates [them] from a sociological perspective." At the same time, as some childhood friends were getting in trouble with the law, Casanova became interested in learning more about the criminal justice system and "what we can do to help."
By 2007, Casanova earned a Bachelor in Sociology and Family Studies from Western Michigan University, unsure of a precise career path but certain he wanted to work with young people. During his senior year, while working at the Boys & Girls Club in Kalamazoo, something clicked. The teenagers he was working with were growing up in an environment similar to his own, and he felt a spark of purpose and meaning. "I was like, oh, goodness, this is where I need to be. That's what started it," Casanova beamed. And he's not finished yet.
People noticed the positive changes that followed Casanova's efforts while he worked at different youth organizations in San Antonio, Texas, and mentors encouraged him to pursue graduate work. He earned a PhD in Social and Cultural Studies of Education from Iowa State University in 2019, awarded two weeks after the birth of his child, Josefina Guadelupe Casanova Espinoza. Today, the devoted dad says his daughter helps him put everything into perspective, bringing his life full circle.
Now a resident of the Phoenix area, Casanova spent July in Adrian working with the Boys & Girls Club of Lenawee, where he guides 12-15 young people in youth participatory action research. His program, partnered with Adrian Public Schools, invites young people to be transformative agents of change in their communities. The goal is to work closely with young people, especially those who may be struggling, to develop their identities as researchers and experts, build their confidence, recognize their strengths, and nurture who they are. Casanova has known the struggles; now he's got the tools to address them. "Coming back here," he said with satisfaction, "it's just a joy."
Boys & Girls Club of Lenawee
340 E Church St, Ste A, Adrian
517-266-9775 | bgclenawee.org
Sky Chandler:Finds Dream Job in Children's Art
Sky Chandler has always loved a good story. Long before she was designing baby clothes for Target, she was a little girl with a big imagination — writing fantasy tales about dragons and sketching the illustrations to go with them. "I used to want to be a writer," she said. "I was such a big reader when I was really little. I still am."
That love of storytelling eventually led the 2021 Clinton High School graduate to Sarasota, Florida, where she graduated from the prestigious Ringling College of Art and Design with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Illustration. These days, Chandler is based in Atlanta and working as an assistant graphic designer for Carter's, creating patterns and prints for children's clothing sold in Target stores across the country.
True to her adventurous imagination, Chandler's road from Clinton to Carter's wasn't a straight line — it was a journey of sketchbooks and competitions, inspiring teachers, and a little bit of twin confusion. She is the daughter of Amy and Roger Chandler. Her mom is assistant principal at Clinton Elementary; her dad, a pilot for Spirit Airlines. She has an identical twin sister, Sophie, and a younger sister, Summer.
During her high school career, Chandler ran cross country, played soccer, and kept up with a full slate of AP and Honors classes. But art was always the pull. She said she fell in love with it while attending Manchester Middle School, but the art program there was not as good as the one at Clinton.
The three sisters transferred to Clinton, where Chandler met Lora Forgiel, the middle school art teacher. "That was the first time I ever really learned what a sketchbook was," she said. "And, as soon as I told her how interested I was, she really encouraged me, gave me extra projects, spent extra time. That's when I started to learn it was something I could actually do."
At Clinton High School, art teacher Ashley Kendrek helped her take the next step. Kendrek entered her students into art competitions and encouraged them to work on their skills. She also guided them through college websites and even took them on tours. "She urged us to go to portfolio days too," Chandler said. "That's when the idea of art as a career really started to feel real." She applied to several top art schools her senior year, but Ringling stood out for its focus on commercial art, the kind made for books, movies, video games, and everyday life, not just galleries.
Chandler's favorite experience came her senior year, when she wrote and illustrated a children's book as part of her thesis. The 36-page book, "With Me," is a "bittersweet story about looking for love all around you and carrying people you love with you," she explained. "I got to marry my two interests. It's the proudest I've ever been of anything I've ever worked on."
During her sophomore and junior summers, Chandler interned with Carter's. That experience led to a full-time position on the Target team after graduation. "I draw the illustrations and turn them into patterns — like the repeating designs on the fabric, the shirt graphics, or even the little foot art on baby pajamas," she said. "I just love it."
In the future, Chandler said she'd like to write and illustrate children's books and perhaps even teach at the college level. "My teachers were my favorite part of school," she said. "The best people I've ever met were my professors. I just love learning."
Chandler may not have become the author of epic dragon tales — at least not yet — but she's doing something just as magical: creating art that wraps around the tiniest humans in our lives, telling soft, joyful stories one pajama set at a time. "It's just me," she said. "I feel really lucky."
Gary Howard's Flight Path
Gary Howard's 40-year flight path has taken him from Deerfield to 30,000-feet high with countless hours in the cockpit. The 1986 Deerfield High School graduate, now a retired Navy pilot flying commercial jetliners across the Atlantic for Delta Air Lines, knew from childhood that he didn't want to sit behind a desk.
"Deerfield is a pretty small community," said Howard. "Everybody knows everybody. Our graduating class had 36 students — and that was one of the larger ones." A self-described "nerd," Howard spent his formative years in high school making his own flight plan. He didn't make waves in prep sports, but he had something else going for him — a lifelong dream of flying.
"I was one of the shortest, smallest kids in the class," he said. "I wanted to be a pilot for as long as I can remember, and I was convinced the best training I was going to get was in the military." He earned a full ROTC scholarship through the University of Michigan and attended Eastern Michigan University, graduating in 1990 with a degree in computer science. From there, he received his commission and headed to flight school in Pensacola, Florida.
Howard spent the first chapter of his 20-year Navy career flying the CH-46 Sea Knight helicopter, a medium-lift transport used to move troops, cargo, and supplies between ships. From 1990 to 1995, he flew missions aboard aircraft carriers before returning to Pensacola to teach the next generation of helicopter pilots.
He later transferred into the Navy's Training and Administration of the Reserves program, flying H-60s in combat search and rescue and special operations roles out of Norfolk, Virginia. "We trained a lot with the SEAL teams," he explained. "It was intense work. But, back then, not much was going on overseas — mostly training."
In 2002, Howard transitioned to fixed-wing aircraft, flying the Navy's C-12, a military version of the King Air 200. He served at commands in New Orleans and Fort Worth before retiring in 2010 as a lieutenant commander. At that point, the airlines weren't hiring, so Howard returned to helicopters, this time for St. Vincent's Hospital in Toledo, flying EMS missions across northwest Ohio. For nine years, he flew with a nurse and a paramedic, usually the only pilot on board. "Especially at night, landing in dark fields, it was a lot," he said. "But the real heroes were the med crews in the back."
The work was rewarding but tough. "We picked up people from car accidents, horseback injuries, gunshots, stabbings — you name it," he said. "The worst part was flying kids. But, when someone pulls through and you hear about it later, it stays with you."
In 2022, Howard secured a job as a commercial airline pilot. Today, he flies the Airbus 330 on international routes for Delta. "My office window has the best view of anybody around," he quipped. And he gets 24-hour layovers in some of the world's most iconic cities, including Paris, Amsterdam, Dublin, and London. "Paris is probably my favorite so far," he said. "There's just so much to see."
Howard and his wife, Lisa, who formerly worked in accounting, live in Sylvania Township. Their daughter, Amanda, is a nurse and lives with her husband and four children in Denver. He jokes that none of his grandkids seem interested in flying — yet!
Howard's career has been anything but static. "Every 10 years or so, I've changed things up — helicopters, fixed wing, back to helicopters, now jets," he said. "It's always been something new and exciting."
As Howard put it, today's jets are "flying computers." But the skills he built over the years still matter. "One of my instructors used to say, ‘Every new pilot starts with two buckets: one full of luck and one empty of skill,'" he observed. "‘The trick is to fill up your skill bucket before your luck bucket runs out.' I think I've done that."
Reflecting on his journey from small-town Michigan to the skies over the Eiffel Tower, Howard just smiled: "It's been a very cool ride."
